Lecture on Walking Purchase of 1737 will explain troubled land history
Milford. Historian Frank Salvati will talk about how the Lenape Indians lost excessive amounts of land to white settlers.
| 01 Aug 2022 | 09:15
Historian and interpreter of Indian affairs Frank Salvati will present a lecture on the Walking Purchase of 1737 at the Pike County Historical Society and Museum Foundation Room on August 20.
The Walking Purchase is a pivotal point in relations between the Delaware (Lenape) Indians and the white settlers. The sons of William Penn, greedy for land, money and minerals as more settlers came into Pennsylvania, perpetrated a fraudulent land grab that would take away much more land than the Lenape intended. The Brothers Penn hired three runners to perform the “walk” and no one seemed to see how unfair this was.
Chief Lappawinsoe, a representative of the Lenape Indians who signed the agreement, was furious to find that the Lenape had been cheated out of so much land. He claimed that the woodsmen “should have walked along the River Delaware or the next Indian path to it.”
”The walkers should have walked for a few miles and then sat down and smoked a pipe, and now and then have shot a squirrel, and not have kept upon the Run, Run, Run all day,” he said.
The museum also has a new exhibit, The Lenape, Original People: Reconciling the Past, Embracing the Future.
The lecture starts at 4 p.m. Suggested donation is $5, and refreshments will be served. The museum is open for visitation Wednesday through Saturday from 1-4 p.m. and Sunday from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. in July and August.